PowerArchiver 2017 officially released!PowerArchiver 2017 is the most important release of PowerArchiver ever, due the to the new Advanced Codec Pack (.PA format). Advanced Codec pack features a comprehensive collection of filters and codecs that let you compress and extract various types of files at great speeds and compression ratios. It has been optimized for multicore processors and 64-bit systems. Unlike experimental archivers, Advanced Codec Pack is very easy to use and does not require any special skills – simply select PA format and it will do all the work for you.

Main .PA (Advanced Codec Pack) Features

Two base modes: Optimized Fast and Optimized Strong deliver the fastest/strongest compression in the industry.

Smart Optimized modes select the best compression/speed ratios on per-file basis, increasing compression rate and speed. In one compression scenario, PowerArchiver can use multiple codecs for different files/extensions! This provides much better compression/speed since we can target codecs better.

Optimized Strong – Strong compression features at reasonable speeds even at Extreme level. Optimized for processors with 4 and more threads. Supports multicore extraction and data deduplication. Special coders for stronger levels delivering better compression than comparable options in competing software.

PDF, DOCX and PNG compression – compress your PDF and DOCX (Office) files between 30% and 70% better than WinRAR, WinZip and 7zip. Also used for PNG, APK, ZIP and other files with deflate streams.

FIPS 140-2 256-bit AES encryption – Advanced Codec Pack (.PA) is very secure. Not only we use FIPS 140-2 validated encryption components, we also apply special transformation filter that ensures that the data being encrypted does not have any LZ compression markers that could make brute-force attacks easier. We consider it considerably more secure than encryption methods available in ZIP and RAR formats.

MP3 codec – Strongest and fastest MP3 compression codec on the market with full multi-core support. Better compression and up to 3x faster speeds than WinZIP MP3 compression.

Special Deduplication filter – fast filter that finds similar data at 50MB/s speeds (single thread). Works great for similar files that have some similar data, for instance when backing up your office files, this filter should increase compression ratios significantly. Compressing Software ISO’s with deduplication filter can lower the size by extra 500MB compared to WR, WZ, 7-zip (Office 2016 ISO 2.25GB example), with super-fast compression!

Special exe/dll filters – collection of special filters that improves compression up to 10-15% for exe/dll files. Super fast!

Multi-core extraction – Most codecs have multi-thread support based on our mtwrap which automatically gives you multi-threaded extraction. This means that extraction is also fast despite use of advanced and strong compression.

Custom compression profiles – Extensive support for custom compression profiles that let you configure 20+ codec options thus making sure you can setup special case scenarios that work the best for your own data.

Actively developed in-house, with frequent updates and new future codecs, optimizations and more. Currently over 10 filters/codecs are transparently used at the same time depending on file and options selected..

Other PowerArchiver 2017 features

Full 64bit support – for maximum speed and memory usage of the new .PA (Advanced Codec Pack). Please use x64 version of PowerArchiver when possible. Used for all compression codecs, improves speed and memory usage.

Improved ZIP engine – Improved speed of our ZIP engine, fastest engine becoming even faster by 10-15% on average. You can now control the number of threads used for compression.

Improved 7-zip support – Multi-core 7-zip support in the 64bit version. Much faster compression speeds than before.

Interface changes – The Classic Toolbar is now the main and only interface. The Modern Toolbar has been removed in order to optimize speed and memory usage. The Classic interface has been extensively improved with the addition of a navbar at the bottom to better navigate all the various features available in PowerArchiver 2017. Startup speed has drastically improved under any condition and it is by up to 2x-3x faster, depending on computer specifications.

Portable version – Portable 32-bit and 64-bit versions of PowerArchiver that can be copied to USB stick and used anywhere without leaving anything on users Windows installation. Full support for all formats including Advanced Codec Pack (.PA) and even shell extensions.

Many other smaller improvements and fixes – Numerous small changes and improvements throughout the application.